Highlights
- Moving some of your belongings in your car when moving to a new home is not only a great option but often a necessity as well.
- The more items you can fit inside your car, the better – especially when doing a second car trip is out of the question.
- As you can expect, some of the tips for packing a car for moving will be common knowledge.
- But there are also tricks for gaining extra storage space when packing a car for a move that can really make a difference for you.
You’re moving to a new home soon and you’ve already made up your mind to transport some of your belongings in your own car.
Now, that seems like a brave decision, especially when that new home is located in another part of the country – many hundreds (or thousands!) of miles away from where you are now. Brave or not, it’s what you’re going to do and there’s no turning back now.
Oftentimes, doing a second car trip will be out-of-the-question impossible so you’re going to have to think of a way to somehow fit all of the things you’re taking with you inside the car.
In fact, packing a car for a cross-country move is anything but child’s play – you’ll need to know how to prevent damage to your belongings, how to maximize the storage space when packing your car, and how to make the car trip safe, comfortable, and pleasant for all car passengers.
The best way to pack a car for a move, with efficiency and safety in mind, is explained below in detail with the help of easy-to-follow tips for packing a car when moving.
What to do before packing your car for a move
Before you start packing your personal vehicle for a move, you’ll need to make sure you’re actually ready for the packing task at hand. These pre-packing steps are important so you’re not recommended to skip them and start filling up the storage space in your car without having a good packing plan first.
STOP buying new stuff prior to the move
Once you’ve made the decision to pack and move some of your possessions in your own vehicle, you should stop buying any new things that you’ll need to later fit into the awfully limited storage space of your car. In other words, you’ll need to become very conscious of what items you acquire shortly before it’s time to move out.
Instead of getting new things that’ll probably need to be transported as well, focus on sorting out the things you have right now (see below) and getting rid of anything that you don’t really need. In most cases, you won’t be able to fit everything in the car, so you’d better be ready to make certain compromises.
And while you won’t likely rush to buy new furniture just before you move away, you may keep purchasing more food items than you can possibly consume before the start of the car trip. Packing perishable food in the car is not a good idea (unless it’s the perishables you plan to eat during the trip itself), while filling up your vehicle with loads and loads of non-perishables such as canned goods is, simply put, a bad idea.
What to Do With Food When Moving
SORT out the things you’re packing in the car
Above all else, you’ll need to sort out the things you plan to pack in the car and see if there are any items that you’d better leave behind. That sorting task is more important than you think simply because it’ll keep you from making a couple of unpleasant mistakes: 1) packing things you won’t really need after the move, and 2) packing items that you shouldn’t due to their hazardous nature.
You should sort out your items and set aside the ones you’re moving in your car during the home inventory process. First of all, get rid of all unwanted things that will only eat up the storage space in your car. And secondly, dispose properly of any dangerous items (anything that is corrosive, explosive, or flammable) – hazardous goods that you are not allowed to pack and transport anyway.
How to Get Rid of Unwanted Items When Moving
TIDY UP and clean the interior of your car
One great way to pack more in your car is to remove any items from inside it that don’t really need to be in there during the cross-country move. You may like to keep your vehicle all tidied up and clean, ready for loading, but you may happen to also have tons of surplus stuff inside that will only limit further the storage space of your personal vehicle.
So, make a thorough inspection of the things inside your car and decide on the spot whether they should stay there or not. Pay special attention to the trunk where you’ll keep most of the packed items anyway. Remember that the more space you free up prior to packing, the more things you’ll be able to fit inside the car – exactly what you’re hoping to do, right?
Also, use a vacuum cleaner (a portable one works fine too) to clean up the car seats and the spaces around them. This way, you’ll contribute to a more pleasant and enjoyable car trip until you reach your final destination.
The Greatest Moving Checklist of All Time
CONSIDER buying an overhead carrier for the car
If your car is relatively small and you know that it just won’t be able to fit all the things you want to take with you, then you may think about adding more storage space to it by purchasing an overhead carrier for your car.
High-quality overhead carriers can be rather expensive and the last thing you’d need during an already costly house move is to spend money on something that you may not come to need after all.
And while that may be true, think of the extra expense as an investment because that’s exactly what it is – the overhead carrier will serve you long after the move is over. What’s more, your inability to fit all the items you’ve moving can prove to be the costlier option in the end.
Do a little research on overhead carriers for automobiles and see if you can find one that you can afford. Go for a hard-case model that is lockable and will offer great protection for your fragile and valuable items during the long-distance car trip.
Thank you this information was extremely helpful